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OLD & THE 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. | 

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I UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, i] 



THE BEICK CHUECH 



A meeting of the Elders, Deacons, and Trustees of the Brick Presbyterian Church was held at 
the close of divine service on the 25th day of May, 1S56, in the church. Mr. Holden, Elder, was 
chosen Moderator. 

It was Resolved, unanimously, " That we have heard with great satisfaction the history of our 
church and congregation, and of the labors of our Pastor, and of the progress of religion in the 
church and congregation during his past ministry, terminating his history with our present change 
of the location of the church edifice ; 

That judging the historical discourse useful in its encouragement to faithful and devoted pas- 
tors, as well as couducive to the edification of Christians in private walks, a copy be requested 
for publication, and that Me. Holder, Elder, Mr. Harding, Deacon, and Mr. Mills, Trustee, 
be a committee for this purpose, and to see to the publication, and that it be recommended to 
them to procure a copyright to control the correctness of the publication." 

Rev. Dr. Spring— Dear Sir, 

It affords us pleasure to communicate to you the preceding resolution, adopted last Sabbath 
morning, and to express the hope that you will comply with the request contained in it at your 
earliest convenience. 

With great respect, 

HOEACE HOLDEN, \ 
RICHARD HARDING, !■ CommAUee. 
DRAKE MILLS, .) 



In Session, Nov. 11th, 1858. 
" Resolved, that Dr. Spring be respectfully requested to furnish for publication a copy of his 
ast sermon preached in the old church in Beekman street, and of his Dedication Sermon 
preached in the new church, and that the Clerk of the Session take the necessary steps for that 
purpose." — Extract from tlie Minutes. 

HORACE HOLDEN, Clerk of Session. 



Brick Church Chapel, Nov. 16, 1858. 
To Horace Holden, Esq., Clerk of the Session of the Brick Presbyterian Church of the city 
of New York — 

My Dear Sir: 

My reply to the note of the Committee of the ruling Elders, Deacons, and Trustees, dated 25th 
of May, 1856, in which I felt constrained to decline the publication of the discourse there re- 
ferred to, was dictated by a reluctance to publish a narrative so familiar in its character, and 
having so many allusions to myself. I now comply with the request of the Session for that dis- 
course, and also for the discourse lately delivered at the dedication of the new church, not be- 
cause I judge either of them worthy of being published, but because they are memorials of 
events which it is thought best to preserve. 

Your affectionate Pastor, 

GARDINER SPRING 




TWO DISCOURSES: 



THE FIRST DELIVERED ON THE 25th OF MAY, 1856, AS THE CLOSING 
SERMON IN THE OLD BRICK CHURCH IN BEEKMAN STREET : 
THE LAST ON THE 31st OF OCTOBER, 1858, AT THE 
DEDICATION OF THE NEW BRICK CHURCH 
ON MURRAY HILL ; 



GARDINER SPRING, D. D., LL. D., 

PASTOR OF THE BRICK PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH IN THE CITY OP NEW YORK. 



NEW YOEK: 
PUBLISHED BY M. W. D ODD, 

50 6 BBOADWAY. 



1858. 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



'• We have thought of thy loving-kindness, God, in the midst of thy temple. 
That ye may. tell it to the generation following ; for this God is our God, for 
ever and ever ; he will be our guide even unto death."— Psalm xlviii. 9-14. 

The present service closes the public worship of God 
in an edifice where it has been enjoyed for 88 years. 
For whatever purposes this hallowed ground may be 
hereafter employed, experience has convinced us that 
it is no longer a fit place for religious worship. We 
have admitted this conviction reluctantly ; we have re- 
sisted it too long. It is now forced upon us by con- 
siderations which we have no doubt God approves, and 
the best interests of his kingdom demand. 

With the future we have less to do, on the present 
occasion, than with the past. The Brick Presbyterian 
Church has, from its origin, occupied a position suf- 
ficiently prominent to justify, even in the eyes of the 
men of the world, some historical notices, which may, 
perhaps, be viewed with interest by others as well as 
ourselves. 

It requires no great labour and very little research to 
furnish the historical outlines of a Christian congrega- 
tion, which dates back only 88 years. The first account 



6 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



we have of Presbyterianism in this city is the combina- 
tion of several Presbyterian families from England, 
Scotland, Ireland, France, and New England, in the year 
1706, who were in the habit of assembling together on 
the Lord's-day, in a private house, and conducting their 
religious services without the aid of any Christian minis- 
ter. The following year they worshipped occasionally 
in the Dutch Church in Garden Street, and in the year 
1716, formed themselves into a regular Presbyterian 
church, under the stated ministry of the Rev. James 
Anderson, a native of Scotland. For three years this 
infant church assembled for public worship in the City 
Hall, then on the corner of Nassau and Wall Streets ; 
and in 1719, they erected the first Presbyterian church 
in Wall Street, out of which was formed the Church of 
the Seceders in Cedar Street, under the pastoral charge 
of the Rev. Dr. Mason, the elder, and also the Brick 
Church in Beekman Street. The corner stone of this 
edifice was laid in the autumn of the year 1766, and on 
the first of January, 1768, it was opened for public 
worship, by a discourse from the Rev. Dr. Rodgers, its 
first pastor. The congregations worshipping in Wall 
Street and in Beekman Street remained for a series of 
years one church, under the same associated pastorate, 
the same Board of Trustees, and the same bench of 
Ruling Elders. This identity of interest was preserved 
during the whole of the Revolutionary war, and down 
to the year 1809. During the war, these two Presby- 
terian churches were the objects of the special vengeance 
and indignity of the enemy. The church in Wall Street 
was converted into barracks, and the Brick Church into 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



7 



a hospital — defaced, stripped of their interior, and left 
in ruins, and the parsonage house burned to the ground. 
On the return of peace, and while these edifices were 
being repaired, the congregations statedly worshipped in 
St. George's and St. Paul's, through the unsolicited and 
generous courtesy of the vestry of Trinity Church. 
After having been repaired at great expense, the Brick 
Church was re-opened in June, 1784, by a discourse 
from Dr. Rodgers, from the words of the Psalmist, " I 
was glad when they said unto me, Let us go into the 
house of the Lord." The ministers successively asso- 
ciated with Dr. Rodgers, after the conclusion of the 
war, were the Rev. James Wilson, from Scotland, the 
Rev. John McKnight, and the Rev. Samuel Miller. 
These congregations, in their united capacity, and for 
many years after the present pastor of the Brick Church 
came to the city, established and sustained a large paro- 
chial school, in Nassau, between Liberty and Cedar 
Streets, and relinquished their funds for this object to 
the Public School directors, on the expressed condition 
that no child whom they should recommend should be 
excluded, and that the Bible should be daily read in the 
schools. 

Serious inconveniences were found to attend the ar- 
rangement of -this collegiate charge ; and by an amicable 
stipulation, in the year 1809, the congregations, till 
then united, were formed into separate and distinct 
churches ; — the Rev. Dr. Rodgers retaining his re- 
lation to both, and the Rev. Dr. Miller the stated 
pastor of the church in Wall Street — Dr. McKnight 
voluntarily resigning his connexion with both the 
churches. 



8 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



Such was the state of the Brick Church the year be- 
fore the ordination and installation of the present pas- 
tor. The eldership consisted of men well known, both 
in civil and ecclesiastical life, and venerable for age and 
character. They were Abraham Vangelder, John 
Thompson, William Ogilvie, Benjamin Egbert, Thomas 
Frazer, John Bingham, John Mills, and Samuel Osgood, 
to which were added, shortly after the separation of the 
churches, William Whitlock, Richard Cunningham, Ren- 
sellaer Havens, and John Adams. While all these 
gentlemen were men of worth and influence, the ruling 
spirit among them, and the man eminent for discern- 
ment, practical wisdom, ardent piety, and vigorous 
action, was John Mills. 

The age and infirmities of Dr. Rodgers had released 
him from all duty, and the great object of the church 
now was to secure the services of a stated pastor. 
There were divisions among them arising from the 
separation previously referred to, from ancient feuds, 
personal animosity, and political excitement. A call 
was presented to the Rev. Dr. John McDowell, of 
Elizabethtown, in New Jersey, which, though sustained 
by a large majority of the congregation, he declined ac- 
cepting. Subsequently a call was presented to the Rev. 
Dr. Andrew Yates, of East Hartford, Connecticut, and 
though unanimous, was declined ; Dr. Yates giving the 
preference to the Professorship of Moral Philosophy in 
Union College. Three efforts were subsequently made 
to induce the congregation to call the Rev. Lyman 
Beecher, then of East Hampton, Long Island ; but for 
want of harmony, this measure was abandoned. Sub- 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



9 



sequently, in May; 1810, the Session deputed two of 
their number to procure the services of the Eev. Dr. 
Speece, of Virginia, on trial ; this effort was also un- 
successful. At the same meeting they also appointed 
the same committee 14 to proceed to Philadelphia, during 
the sessions of the General Assembly, and make appli- 
cation to any of the Presbyterian ministers that may be 
convened there, whose piety and talents would, in their 
judgment, render him acceptable to the congregation, 
and earnestly solicit such minister to make the church a 
visit of two or three Sabbaths, with a view to a per- 
manent settlement as pastor ; and in case they should 
not find any minister there suitably qualified, that they 
make inquiry of the ministers present ; and if they re- 
ceive well grounded information respecting any minis- 
ter whose piety and talents would probably make him 
acceptable to the congregation, that they take such 
measures for procuring a visit from such minister as 
they m&y think proper." There is no record on the 
minutes of the Session of the action of this committee, 
and no report of the results of their appointment. 

At a meeting of the Session, on the 28th of May, 
1810, the first resolution was adopted which relates to 
your present pastor. He had not a single acquaintance 
in the congregation, nor does he know by whom, nor by 
what means his name was presented to the Session. 
He had passed through the city the preceding week, and 
preached a single discourse in the church in Cedar 
Street, under the care of the late Dr. John B. Romeyn, 
and who was then in Philadelphia. While there, a spec- 
tator of the transactions of the Assembly, the Session 



MEMORIAL OF GOD 7 S GOODNESS. 



passed the resolution inviting him to supply the pulpit. 
He accepted this invitation, and occupied the pulpit the 
first Sabbath in June, preaching in the morning from 
the words, " Wherefore come ye out from among them, 
and be ye separate, and touch not the unclean thing, 
and I will be a father unto you, and ye shall be my sons 
and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty f and in the 
evening, to a crowded audience, from the words, " By 
the grace of God, I am what I am. 77 I hold in my hand 
the identical discourses which I then preached, and have 
often been filled with wonder that these two jejune and 
puerile discourses should have decided the question on 
which so many interests depended for time and eternity. 
But the hand of God was in the whole procedure. At 
the close of the morning service, and in the church, the 
Session had a meeting, at which Dr. Rodgers presided, 
and which the Deacons and Trustees were invited to at- 
tend, at which they unanimously resolved that notice be 
given from the pulpit, at the close of the afternoon and 
evening service, that the congregation assemble the 
next day to take into consideration the propriety of 
making out a call for Mr. Grardiner Spring to become 
the stated pastor of the Brick Church. 

On the following day that meeting was held, the Rev. 
Dr. Milledoler, then the pastor of the church in Rutgers 
Street, presiding, and a unanimous call was made out 
for the proposed candidate. I was greatly embarrassed 
by this unexpected invitation. A call had already been 
presented to me from the church in Andover, Massa- 
chusetts, from the Park Street Church in Boston, and at 
the same time I had been requested to receive a call 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



11 



from the church in New Haven. The elders of the 
Brick Church were urgent for a prompt and immediate 
decision, on account of the peculiar state of the congre- 
gation ; and though I did not formally answer the call 
till the 6th of July, I gave to Mr. John Mills, the lead- 
ing ruling elder, such intimations of my purpose that 
they had a right to consider me, and did consider me, 
as their minister. It appeared to my own mind the 
call of the Great Head of the church to a field of labour 
too important to be compared with others, and too un- 
equivocal to be misunderstood. Unfitted for it as I was, 
yet encouraged to believe that I should have strength 
according to my day, I accepted the solemn charge, and 
was ordained by the Presbytery of New York, and in- 
stalled the pastor of this people on the 8th of August, 
1810. Of the Presbytery by which I was ordained, con- 
sisting of Rev. Dr. Rodgers, Rev. George Faitoute, 
Rev. Peter Fish, Rev. Philip Milledoler, Rev. Samuel 
Miller, Rev. John B. Romeyn, and the Rev. Ezra Stiles 
Ely, not one remains.* 

The fathers, where are they ? and the younger pro- 

* Among those who were subsequently received into it, the following minis- 
ters also sleep in the dust :— Rev. William Boardman, Kev. John Teasman, Kev. 
Henry Blatchford, Kev. Philip M. Whelpley, Bev. Samuel Whelpley, Bev. John 
B. Komeyn, Bev. Mathias Bruen, Bev. Henry P. Strong, Bev. Mathew L. B. 
Perrine, Bev. Joseph S. Christman, Bev. Henry Hunter, Bev. Elias Crane, Bev. 
Daniel Newell, Bev. Seymour B. Funk, Bev. Stephen N. Bowan, Bev. E. W. 
Baldwin, Bev. Daniel Carroll, Bev. Joseph Sanford, Rev. Henry White, Rev. 
George W. Perkins, Eev. Erskine Mason, Bev. Truman Norton, Rev. A. J. 
Graham, Rev. John Little, Bev. S. Larned, Rev. E. Holt, Bev. Walter King, 
Bev. Ward Stafford, Rev. Flavel S. Mines, Rev. Isaac Lewis, Rev. F. Cham- 
berlain, Rev. Albert Judson, Rev. George Bourne, Rev. Bobert Birch, Rev. 
Moses C. Searl, Rev. Charles M. Oakly, Rev. George Carrington, Rev. John 
Anderson, Rev. Nathaniel S. Prime, Rev. Ichabod S. Spencer, and Rev. Samuel 
E. Cornish. 



12 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



phets do not live for ever. The distinguished indi- 
viduals to whom I was under the greatest obligations, 
so long as they remained members of the Presbytery, 
were the Rev. Dr. Miller and the Rev. Dr. Perrine, both 
of whom filled the office of Professor of Church History 
and Government in our theological seminaries, and died 
full of years and full of honours. Their uniform friend- 
ship, their kind and gentleman-like deportment toward 
me, their wise counsels, their active assistance in my 
arduous work, the interest they took in my usefulness, 
and the influence they exerted in my favour in seasons 
of solicitude, conflict and depression, demand from me 
this public and grateful acknowledgment. 

During the first year of my ministry, I was constrained 
by necessity to the preparation of those discourses 
which I could most easily prepare. My subjects were 
such as were most familiar to my own mind, rather than 
those which were demanded by the character and con- 
dition of the congregation. But no sooner did it please 
God to give me the confidence of the people, than topics 
were carefully selected with a more special regard to 
the indications of divine providence, and the wants of 
those to whom I was called to minister. Both the 
elders and the people expected from me discourses that 
were addressed to the popular ear and taste. There was 
a standard of preaching and a feeling on this subject 
which tried and embarrassed me, and which led to a 
carefully prepared discourse from the words, "Speak 
unto us smooth things." God was pleased to put honour 
upon this discourse, and to produce the conviction on 
the minds of those who heard it, that the preacher's 



MEMOEIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 13 

business is to 'preach His truth, and leave the conse- 
quences with Him, and that instead of aiming to please 
men, his great aim ought to be to please God, who trieth 
the hearts. 

There was at that time prevalent in the city a sort of 
hybrid theology, half Arminian and half Antinomian — 
tinctured with the views of " Marshal on Sanctification," 
on the one hand, and the ritualism of High Church Episco- 
pacy on the other — which, young as I was, I felt myself 
called on to investigate and resist. In the main, it 
was evangelical and Calvinistic, but it was hyper- 
Calvinism, and not that hind of Calvinism which is 
taught in the Bible. Some of my own people were 
not a little imbued with it, and it led to a series of dis- 
courses on the " Discriminating traits of Christian char- 
acter," in which the agitated questions w T ere treated, 
not polemically, but practically. These discourses the 
Great Head of the church condescended to attend with 
his blessing, and to make the means of disturbing false 
hopes, and bringing many persons out of darkness into 
his marvelous light. 

It was the preparation of these discourses which first 
directed my own thoughts to the discussion of subjects 
in a series of discussions, comprising from twenty to thirty 
discourses on the same general topic, so many of which 
have been delivered in this sanctuary, and subsequently 
found their way to the press. The most important of 
the series was that which, in the order of time, immedi- 
ately followed the discussions on Christian characteris- 
tics. It comprised a system of theology, and consisted 
of more than one hundred discourses. It was the great 



14 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



effort of my life. The preparation of these discourses 
occupied more than three years of laborious and continu- 
ous study and preaching. Very many of them were 
delivered on the evening of the Lord's day, and 
to very large audiences. Nor do I know that any 
series of sermons preached by me have been listened to 
with greater interest, or have been more extensively 
useful. It was a system of theology not prepared for 
the schools, but for the people. And while it blinked 
no hard questions, save those which the word of God 
bid us to let alone, its main object was to show the bear- 
ing of every truth upon the conscience and heart ; to 
exalt God, and to lay the sinner humbled and without 
excuse, trembling, yet hoping, at the foot of the cross. 
The practical application of every doctrine was the most 
laboured part of almost every discourse ; nor have I 
ever preached to more solemn audiences, nor with more 
evident tokens of the divine favour and presence, than 
when preaching some of these discourses. One of 
these, I well recollect, cost six weeks' labour ; and 
I mention this not for the discouragement, but the en- 
couragement of those ministers who, in the vigor of their 
days, are willing to be working men. 

My preparations for the Sabbath have been habitu- 
ally, almost always and uniformly made in season ; never, 
to my recollection, except in two instances, deferred to 
the last day of the week ; nor do I know of any better 
way of gaining time, labour, knowledge and health, than 
such an arrangement. One little circumstance, in con- 
nexion with the series of theological discourses, deserves 
here to be mentioned, that gave interest to them. 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 15 



During their delivery in the winter season, in addi- 
tion to the Thursday evening lecture, there was es- 
tablished a Bible-class, or rather a theological class, in 
"the old Session-room," comprising all of both sexes 
who chose to attend, for the purpose of reviewing, ex- 
amining, and enforcing, by question and answer, the 
discourse of the preceding Lord's day. It was a large 
class, often numbering more than a hundred, and, 
though it consisted of gentlemen in professional and 
literary life, of merchants and mechanics, and teachers, 
and ladies of greater and less distinction ; and though 
all liberty was allowed of proposing questions on sub- 
jects of difficulty, it was a religious class, and was under- 
stood to be a religious service. There was no restraint, 
but the most unembarrassed and cheerful discussion ; 
yet there was no rudeness, no frivolity. It was one of 
the most interesting and solemn services of the season, 
and gave solemnity and interest to all our other services. 
God was with us by the influence of his sacred spirit. 
And when we came to the practical application of any 
such great doctrine as man's depravity, the sovereignty 
of God, the nature of holiness, the nature and necessity 
of regeneration, the great atonement of his Son, and 
the retribution of his punitive justice, many a time did 
proud heads droop, and the question was answered by 
a tear. Men and women are now living who, though 
widely scattered, will never forget this beautiful service. 
And here commenced the first memorable outpouring of 
God's spirit upon this people. Not far from thirty of 
this class, principally young, were here turned from the 
power of Satan unto God, some of whom have died in 



16 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



faith and hope, some of whom live to exert a Christian 
influence, and some of whom are eminent for their use- 
fulness in the gospel ministry. 

God had graciously given testimony to the word of 
his grace, as here preached, at earlier periods. The 
thought has no doubt often crossed the minds of re- 
flecting Christians that those who have occupied a place 
on the earth during the last fifty years, have lived in a 
remarkable age of the world, not only as it respects 
science and the arts, and the progress of civil society, 
but in regard to the cause of vital piety. The period, 
commencing with the year 1792, and terminating with 
1842, was a memorable period in the history of the Am- 
erican Church. Scarcely any portion of it, except the 
high church Episcopalian and the Unitarian churches of 
Massachusetts, but were graciously visited by copious 
effusions of the Holy Spirit. From north to south, 
and from east to west, our male, and more especially 
our female academies, our colleges and our churches 
drank largely of this fountain of living waters. It was 
my privilege to enter upon the course of academical 
life not far from the meridian of this bright day. There 
were no subjects that interested my mind more deeply 
when I began my ministry among this people, than those 
revivals of religion which passed over the land of my 
boyhood. This interest increased with time and official 
labours and responsibility, and exercised a most import- 
ant influence upon my whole course. Sparse clouds of 
mercy had been hovering over the congregation during 
the first four years of my ministry, and not a few, 
especially of those in middle life, had been brought into 



MEMOEIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



17 



the kingdom of God. The year 1814 was a year of 
severe labor and deep solicitude ; as it drew towards 
its close, of great discouragement and depression. It 
seemed to me that I must abandon my post, and that 
neither my mind, my heart nor my health were ade- 
quate to its constantly accumulating duties. My intel- 
lectual resources seemed to be exhausted, and drained 
dry. Many a time, after preaching, did I remain long 
in the pulpit that I might not encounter the faces of 
the people as I left the church ; and many a time when 
I left it did I feel that I could never preach another 
sermon. Yet I labored on week after week, without 
discovering to what extent the Spirit of God was carry- 
ing forward his own noiseless work. I perceived no- 
thing to encourage me but an unusual enlargement and 
urgency in prayer, a greater facility in the selection of 
fitting themes for the pulpit, and more freedom and 
earnestness in declaring the whole counsel of God. God 
remarkably interposed to relieve my mind from its de- 
pression, and gave me such enlarged and delightful 
views of his truth, that my whole ministry received a 
new and cheered impulse. It was easy, also, to perceive 
that the spirit of grace and supplication was being 
poured out upon the people. The weekly prayer-meet- 
ing and the weekly lecture were full of interest. Days 
of fasting and prayer were occasionally observed, and a 
Saturday-evening prayer-meeting was established by 
the young men of the congregation. Our Sabbaths 
became deeply solemn and affecting ; we watched for 
them like those who watch for the morning, and I verily 

believe we anticipated them with greater pleasure 
2 



18 



MEMORIAL OF GOD 7 S GOODNESS. 



and expectation than the sons and daughters of earth 
ever anticipated their brightest jubilee. This was the 
first strongly marked revival of God's work among this 
people ; and I take this notice of it because it was so 
emphatic an expression of God's goodness to your young 
minister. Poor a thing as I have been, and still con- 
tinue to be, it was this work of grace which made me 
what I am ; which gave me entirely new views of the 
great objects of the ministry, and made my work my 
joy. I loved it before, but never so ardently as 
then. But for this early season of mercy, during the 
summer of 1814, I do not see how I could ever have re- 
mained among you. It was the Lord's doing, and it is 
marvelous in our eyes. The ingathering was not great, 
but it was the finest of the wheat. I may not mention 
their names. 

This was but the beginning of days of mercy. The^ 
commencement of the year 1815 was the dawning of a 
still brighter day. The last Sabbath of the old year and 
the evening services of that Sabbath will be long re- 
membered. Eight or ten persons, during the following 
week, were found to be awake, and in earnest for their 
salvation. The whole winter was a day of the right- 
hand of the Most High. The cloud of mercy extended 
itself through the following spring, and summer, and 
autumn. In the month of November the Bible-class 
was reorganized, the Saturday evening prayer-meeting 
was renewed, and God appeared to take the work into 
his own hands. There was complaint and hostility ; 
there were not wanting apprehensions in the minds 
of some of the pastors and churches in the city that 



MEMOEIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



19 



the work savored more of fanaticism than intelligent and 
sober thought. But the apprehensions were groundless. 
The blessing was near ; the sacred influence was silent 
as the dew of heaven. There was no outbreak and no 
disorder. There was prayer. There was solemn and 
earnest preaching. There were unexpected and un- 
thought of instances of seriousness among the gay and 
frivolous, in the families of the rich as well as the poor, 
among the immoral as well as the moral, and many 
were the instances of conversion to God. The third 
Thursday of January was set apart by about thirty 
members of the church as a day of fasting, humiliation 
and prayer. It was in a private house in the rear of St. 
Paul's, in Church street ; and such a day I never saw 
before, and have never seen since. It was closed under 
strong and confident expectation that God was near, 
and that his spirit was about largely to descend upon 
the people. And so it was. A delightful impulse was 
given to the work by this day of prayer. The promise 
was made good, "Before they call I will answer, and 
while they are yet speaking I will hear." The weekly 
lecture, attended on the evening of that day, was perhaps 
the most solemn service of my ministry. The subject of 
the discourse was suggested by the words, " Marvel not 
that I said unto you, Ye must be born again." God 
was with the hearers and the preacher ; his spirit moved 
them as the trees of the forest are moved by a mighty 
wind. There is good reason to believe that the minds 
of more than one hundred persons were deeply im- 
pressed with a sense of their lost condition as sinners, 
and their need of an interest in Christ, on that evening. 



20 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



Enemies were silenced ; members of other churches 
came among us to see and mark the character of the 
work for themselves, and all classes were constrained to 
confess, " This is the finger of God." Between one and 
two hundred attended the meetings for religious inquiry 
and conversation, and deep solemnity pervaded the 
whole people. There was great eagerness for religious 
instruction, and great satisfaction in the soul-humiliating 
and soul encouraging doctrines of the cross. The work 
was rapid. The period of awakening and conviction in 
many instances was very short — so short that older 
Christians began to doubt the genuineness of such con- 
versions. There was no reason for the doubt. Some 
of the brightest and most enduring Christians amongst 
us were those very persons whose conversion was 
almost as sudden as that of Saul of Tarsus. The 
gathering of this protracted harvest was rich, consisting 
sometimes of thirty and forty, and at one communion 
of more than seventy, filling the broad aisle of the 
church — a lovely spectacle to God, angels and men. 

There have been five seasons of the especial out- 
pouring of God's spirit upon this people during the 
ministry of their present pastor. They were inter- 
spersed between the years 1812 and 1834, more or less 
copious, but always seasons of delightful refreshing, 
from the presence of the Lord. If the tree is known by 
its fruit, they are proved to have been the fruit of God's 
Spirit. The subjects of this work of grace have in al- 
most all instances run well ; they have turned out intelli- 
gent and active Christians. Many of them have been 
called to their last earthly rest • nor shall I forget the 



MEMORIAL OF GOD r S GOODNESS. 



21 



blessedness and the blessed scenes of their last hours. 
Many of them are ministers of the gospel, and more the 
wives of ministers. Many of them are teachers and 
superintendents of Sabbath-schools. Many of them are 
ruling elders and deacons in other churches, while some 
remain in the honourable fulfilment of these offices 
among ourselves. Very many of them are scattered 
through this wide land, and distant churches and the 
distant wilderness are made glad for them. I never was 
so gratefully impressed with this fact, and with the high 
privilege of preaching the gospel in this sanctuary, as 
on an unexpected tour through Western New York and 
the Western States on the Upper Mississippi. Every- 
where I met those who remembered the young minister 
and the Old Session Room. I heard of the death of 
some far away, and it was affecting to learn that in 
their last hours their thoughts of grateful praise were 
turned toward these scenes of mercy. 

It will be found by an inspection of our records, that 
after the separation of the Brick and Wall Street 
churches, and before the installation of the present pas- 
tor, the session were faithfully employed in acts of pain- 
ful discipline. Church discipline is not less truly an 
ordinance of Grod than church communion. No church 
can prosper that connives at heresy or immorality 
among its communicants. This unwelcome duty was 
faithfully pursued for several years after my settlement 
among this people, and has been discharged with per- 
fect unanimity ever since. In the early part of my 
ministry, there were some avowed infidels in the church, 
who were the disciples of Paine and Palmer ; there 



22 



MEMORIAL OF GOD ? S GOODNESS. 



were, also, avowed Universalists ; there have been from 
time to time immoral men and licentious, whom no 
means could reclaim, and they have been cast out. It 
has often been at great sacrifice of feeling, and some of 
interest and influence that these acts of discipline have 
been performed • but however reluctantly and cauti- 
ously, it is a work which has been done. There have 
also been evils in the church at large with which the 
Brick Church has sympathized, and in the pressure of 
which it has endeavored to exert a healing and conserva- 
tive influence. The great schism in the Presbyterian 
Church in the United States, which issued in the exci- 
sion of so many churches in Western New York, was 
one in which this church took no part, and which it 
endeavored to prevent. We saw and felt that there 
were errors in doctrine and in church polity that were 
at variance with our standards; but it was our judgment 
that there was a constitutional remedy for them, and 
that it ought to have been adopted. We had no con- 
fidence in the men who were the leaders of the New 
School party, and believed that their aims were to 
secure exclusive power ; but we could not believe that 
the mass of their followers were not true to our stand- 
ards, and could never be persuaded that such a whole- 
sale excision, without any previous trial, was consistent 
with sound Presbyterianism. Yet all our sympathies in 
doctrine and in polity were with the Old School. We 
were crowded to the wall, and called on to decide 
whether or not our allotment should be cast with the New 
School, who had abandoned themselves to leaders with 
whom we had no sort of sympathy, or with the Old 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



23 



School, with whom our doctrinal views and views of 
church order were in . unison, while we disapproved of 
their excinding acts. Nor did we long hesitate, but 
formed our decision, after having frankly expressed our 
dissent from their measures, to remain with the 
excinding party. This was an unhappy division, though 
overruled for good. There are hundreds of as good 
men and sound Presbyterians in the excinded churches 
as are to be found among ourselves ; and when time, that 
great healer, shall have purged them of the unhallowed 
leaven, and fostered a more fraternal spirit in both 
these branches of the great Presbyterian family in this 
land, we doubt not they will once more become united 
and harmonious. Blame was imputed to us by 
both parties for our neutral course ; but we did not 
think it neutral. Our decision to remain with the Old 
School was prompt and firm, and not less prompt 
and firm was our Protest against its excinding acts, 
and that Protest now stands on the records of 
the presbytery. We did not deem this a neutral 
course ; nor could we, with an honest conscience, have 
adopted any other, without fomenting still further 
disunion, and forming, as was seriously thought of, a 
third party in a church which ought ever to have been 
one. 

In those great and benevolent enterprises for which 
the age in which we live has been distinguished, it has 
been the privilege of the Brick Church to bear her part. 
Taking the forty-six years of my pastorate together, 
no church in the land has given more bountifully 
to the cause of domestic and foreign missions. It 



24 MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 

has done not a little also in the work of educating 
poor and pious young men for the gospel ministry. 
Boston, New York, Elizabethtown, Princeton, and the 
West and far West to this day have eminent minis- 
ters, in the Congregational, Presbyterian and Dutch 
Reformed Churches, who were beneficiaries of this 
church. 

Of God's goodness toward myself, I might write 
volumes without exhausting the theme. My own life 
and the life of her he so early gave me, have 
been spared to us, while the great mass of the 
companions of our youth among this people sleep 
among the dead. It is a coincidence which an old 
man may be pardoned for taking notice of, that this day 
on which we now meet, completes the fiftieth year of 
our married life. It was on the twenty-fifth of May, 
1806, the Lord's Day, that we were united in bonds not 
to be severed but by death. This twenty-fifth of May, 
1856, also the Lord's Day, celebrates our " golden wed- 
ding,' 7 and we are both well pleased in thus inviting you 
to this religious celebration which looks back upon so 
many interesting facts in the narrative of oui pilgrim- 
age. Thirteen of our children were born in the midst 
of you, and baptized in this house of God ; and you have 
generously borne with their failings and ours. Six of 
the fifteen have died since our connection with you, and 
you have sympathised with our trials, and liberally pro- 
vided for our wants and theirs. Your unexpected 
bounty to us two years ago, when I was thousands of miles 
from you, and knew not of the generous arrangement 
so nobly made in order to relieve the solicitude of the 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



25 



evening of our days, demands this grateful and public 
acknowledgment.* 

My labours among you have been, for the year 
past, curtailed and embarrassed, by the visitation of 
God. The world of sense has been for the most 
part shut out from my obstructed vision ; a heav}^ cloud 
has hung upon it, which I know not will ever be so re- 
moved that I can labour among you with comfort or 
usefulness. I bow to this visitation ; I am not unhappy 

s The bounty here referred to, and so unexpectedly dispensed, will the better 
appear from the following documents : — 

New Yoek, 1th June, 1854. 

Puescant to public notice given from the pulpit, a meeting ot the male members and stated 
hearers of the Brick Presbyterian Church in Beekman Street was held this day in the church, 
*o consider and determine, agreeably to said notice, upon a subject of interest to the congrega- 
tion, embraced in the eighth section of the act to provide for the Incorporation of Beligious Socie- 
ties, in relation to ministers' salaries. 

On motion, Samuel Maesh, Esq., was called to preside as Chairman, and Moses Allen, Esq., 
was appointed Secretary. 

The notice under -which the meeting was called having been read, the following resolutions 
were offered, and, after having been duly considered, were unanimously adopted: 

L In consideration of the arduous labors of our excellent pastor, for a long series of years, at a 
salary below the average amount paid to many clergymen of this city, to remunerate in some 
measure his past services, aud more adequately compensate them in future, -Resolved, That the 
salary of the Bev. Dr. Spring hereafter be fixed at five thousand dollars per annum, commencing 
with the present fiscal year. 

II. Resolved, That the preceding resolution be communicated to the Board of Trustees, and 
that they be requested to ratify the same, agreeably to said act. 

III. Resolved, That Horace Holden, Samuel Marsh, Moses Allen, Guy Eichards, and Ira Bliss, 
be a committee to communicate these resolutions to the Eev. Dr. Spring, and to express to him 
the undiminished confidence and affection of this. church and congregation, and their earnest 
prayer that God may long preserve him to be His minister to this people. 

SAMUEL MAESH, Chairman. 

Moses Allen, Secretary. 



At a meeting of the Board of Trustees of the Brick Presbyterian Church, on the 13th of June, 
1851, Mr. Holden presented to the Board a certified copy of the proceedings of a meeting of the 
congregation, held in the church, on Wednesday, the 7th day of June ult, which was read and 
ordered to be entered on the minutes. 

Whereupon, on motion, it was unanimously Resolved, That this Board do approve of, and 
hereby ratify and confirm the aforesaid proceedings of the congregation, fixing the salary of the 
Eev. Dr. Spring at five thousand dollars per annum, to commence the first day of May last. 

A true copy from the minutes. 

THOS. EGGLESTON, Clerk. 



New Yoke, 13th June, 1854. 

Eev. De. Spedtg. 

Deae Sir : The undersigned have been appointed a committee to communicate to you the 



26 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



under it. I have no doubt of the care and faithfulness 
of our Heavenly Father in thus laying his rod upon me. 
I have never been unhappy in my work, but have 



vice ; thankful above all earthly things that God was 
pleased to put me into the ministry. I have never re- 
gretted the choice for a moment. I have found trials 
in it, but not one more than were required by the im- 
perfections of my own character, my position and my 
usefulness ; and were I now in the bloom of youth and 
secular promise, of all employments in the world I 



accompanying resolutions, passed unanimously, at a meeting of the congregation, and subse- 
quently in like manner ratified and confirmed by the Board of Trustees. 

It affords us great pleasure to discharge this duty, and it is only embittered with the regret 
that this act of justice has been so long delayed, much of which delay may be chargeable to our 
own negligence or forgetfulness, not to use a harsher name. 

It is gratifying to be able to state, that on this occasion but one sentiment pervaded the entire 
meeting; not the slightest dissent was manifested in thought, word, or deed. It was the spon- 
taneous expression of grateful feelings from full and thankful hearts. 

For almost half a century yOu have occupied the same post, and the same sphere of labor and 
of duty. 

Some of us have sat under your ministry for more than forty years, and during that long 
period can bear testimony to your untiring industry, your unbending integrity in the exhibition 
of gospel truth, amid conflicts and parties, and your entire devotion to the appropriate duties 01 
the ministry. 

"We feel too that it is neither flattery to you nor vain boasting in us, but a thankful expression 
of gratitude to God, to say, that yours has not been an unprofitable ministry, nor your influence 
been confined to this church. "We can see traces of your faithful preaching, marked by the 
Divine Spirit, not only in our own city and vicinity, but in almost every State of this vast re- 
public ; and we expect, if we are ever so happy as to arrive at our Father's house on high, to 
meet multitudes there of those whom neither you nor we have known in the flesh, brought home 
to glory through your instrumentality. 

It is a source of delightful reflection to us, that in the early evening of your days, after so long 
a ministry among us, you retain the undiminished confidence and affection of your whole people, 
an affection as warm and fresh as crowned the day when first you devoted your youthful prime 
in this church, to Christ and his cause. 

Our beloved pastor ! these expressions but feebly represent our own sincere emotions. 

We would humbly commend you to the Great Head of the church, and earnestly pray that He 
may preserve you yet for many years to come, to preach the everlasting gospel to this people — 
that He may make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you, and finally, when our warfare is 
accomplished, that He may receive you and us to that blessed communion where our love shall 
be for ever perfect, and our joy for ever full. 




as in every view my chosen ser- 



Eespectfully and affectionately, 



HOKACE HOLDEN", 
SAMUEL MARSH, 
MOSES ALLEN, 
IRA BLISS, 
GUT RICHARDS, 




MEMORIAL OF GOD ? S GOODNESS. 



27 



would choose that of a minister of the gospel. With all 
my unworthiness, I would go to the throne and say, 
" Here, Lord, am I ; send me /" This conviction grows 
upon me as my infirmity gradually disqualifies me for 
the labors to which I have been accustomed. I cannot 
speak of the glad emotions which fill my heart as, in 
the suspension of my more vigorous studies, I some- 
times look over the thousands of manuscripts I have 
been allowed to prepare, and reflect upon the privilege 
of having been permitted to utter so much precious 
truth to this beloved people. It is a delightful view to 
my own mind that, with all my deficiencies, God has 
not permitted me to be a loiterer in his vineyard, and 
that, however imperfectly, my work has not been negli- 
gently done. What my motives have been another day 
will show. Of one thing I am confident, that I have 
been devoted to it, regardless of all other voca- 
tions. My great cause of solicitude now is that I shall 
wane, and fade, and faint, and die "of having nothing 
to do." I find these days of unreading and unstudious 
repose the greatest trial of my life, except my sins. I 
ask your indulgence, your sympathy and your prayers, 
that God would give me a cheerful mind, and so direct 
me in the employment of my time that my life may not 
become a burden, and that I may not be a cumberer of 
he ground. Yet, I may not, I do not, distrust him. 
Because thou hast been my help ; therefore, under the 
shadow of thy wings will I rejoice. 

And now, in this brief review, what shall we say ! 
One thought forces itself upon your minds and my own ! 
It relates to a theme on which I have so often dwelt in 



28 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



this sacred desk : The goodness of God, how wonderful is it ! 
The rising and setting sun proclaim it, and every star of 
the dark night. Like the milky way, it fills the heavens 
with its whiteness, and like the rainbow painted on the 
cloud, it spans them with its prismatic beauty. The 
atmosphere we breathe is surcharged with it, and 
it is conducted off in its ten thousand electric forms. 
Every bird, fish, and worm, every buzzing insect, every 
plant and flower, and every blade of grass inhale it. 
Every sea, every lake and fountain, every river and 
stream, and sparkling dew drop receive alike their 
riches and their beauty from this uncreated source. 
How much more richly and purely, then, does it flow 
here in the sanctuary where all its streams are confluent, 
and from the mountain tops of Zion send gladness 
through the city of our God ! We cannot comprehend 
the love that brought the Lord of Glory to the manger 
and the cross ; that here proclaims the glad tidings of 
great joy, and that sends forth his Spirit to call the 
wanderers home. " that men would praise the Lord 
for his goodness!" " How great is thy goodness to 
them that fear thee, to them that put their trust in thee 
before the sons of men !" 

I love this place where I now stand — 

" Here my best friends, my kindred, dwell, 
Here God, my Saviour, reigns." 

Had any one told me twenty years ago that I should 
live to see it abandoned as a place of religious worship, 
I should have thought him a romancer, if not a mad- 
man ; yet the hour of abandonment has come. On an 



MEMORIAL OF GOD ? S GOODNESS. 



29 



occasion like the present, something is due to this 
ancient sanctuary. The speaker stands here for the 
last time ; and you, beloved friends, meet for the last time 
in the consecrated place where we have so often as- 
sembled for the worship of God. As before intimated, 
I am not ignorant of the defects of my ministry. Yet, 
have I this thankful conviction, that, so far as I have 
known it, I have not shunned to declare the whole 
council of God. If I have not, testify against me this 
day. We call upon you to witness, we call upon the 
sainted spirits of the departed to witness, we make our 
appeal to the walls of this hallowed edifice, if the truth 
of God, detached from the systems of human philosophy, 
from the misnamed improvements and ultraisms of the 
age, and from the popular daubing with untempered 
mortar, has not been proclaimed from this pulpit. This 
house has also been greatly endeared to us as " the 
house of prayer," as the "house of prayer for all 
people. 7 ' Many are the seasons which the living and 
the dead have here enjoyed in sweet communion with 
God and one another. This house has been our thankful 
resort in prosperity, in adversity it has been our refuge. 
Here the aged and the young have come for the first and 
last time to commemorate the love of Christ at his table. 
Here our children have been baptized, and their children 
after them, and here we have wept and prayed together 
as God has called them from these earthly scenes. 
Here other generations have listened, as you now listen, 
and around this spot and beneath it are the sepulchres of 
the departed. I seem to stand to-day amid generations 
that are past, so vividly does my imagination people 



30 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



these seats with faces and forms whose place now 
knows them no more. Pleasant, yet mournful are these 
reminiscences ; memory has no associations more de- 
lightful than those which run by the waters of the sanc- 
tuary. This house has also been the stranger's home. 
Of this and of that man it shall be one day said, that 
" he was born here." Many a wanderer from other 
lands, and more from distant regions of our own 
broad, territory, have here sought and made their 
peace with God ; while many a backslider has been 
restored, amid scenes which have given joy to the 
angels of God, and told of the years of the right hand 
of the Most High. Recollections of individual charac- 
ter and deep and tender interest gush upon us to-day, 
which, while we must suppress, are full of thankfulness 
and praise. " We have thought of thy loving-kindness, 
God, in the midst of thy temple," that " we may tell 
it to the generations following," and that " this God is 
our Gocl for ever and ever, and will be our guide even 
unto death." 

But our work and our privileges in this house of God 
here have an end. It is His voice which to-day says to 
us, 11 Arise ye, 'and depart hence, for this is not your 
rest." We have occupied it too long ; and although it 
has been for the benefit and enlargement of other con- 
gregations, it has been not only to the diminution of our 
strength, but to the injury of our habits as a people, 
and almost to the breaking up of our second service on 
the Sabbath. Notwithstanding the doubts of some, and 
the officious and uncalled-for interference of others, we 
ourselves are satisfied that this once tranquil and cen- 



MEMORIAL OF GOD 7 S GOODNESS. 



31 



tral spot is no longer a place of repose either for the 
preacher or the hearers. We have no longer the unob- 
structed privileges of the gospel. Our weekly lecture 
and our weekly prayer-meeting, as well as our Sabbath- 
school, are of necessity discontinued ; while it is at no 
small inconvenience that a single religious service is sus- 
tained on the Lord's day. The question has been asked, 
Why not leave this church as a church for strangers, and 
for the hotels and boarding-houses in this part of the 
city ? To this we have this conclusive answer, We our- 
selves have proposed to do so. At a meeting of the 
Presbytery of New York, I myself made the proposi- 
tion to the churches that this congregation would sub- 
scribe $50,000 for that purpose, on condition that the 
other congregations would unite in raising the balance 
of $150,000. The Presbytery received the proposal 
with favour, and appointed a committee to take it into 
consideration. That committee reported against the 
proposed arrangement, and the Presbytery and the con- 
gregations dropped the subject. 

We have come to the conclusion, therefore, to quit 
this edifice, not indeed without difficulty, but deliber- 
ately. And we owe many thanks to those who, amid 
all the turmoil from without, all the foreign influence, 
and all the gradual dereliction from our services of our 
own congregation, have stood by us in this crisis of our 
history. For years we have been almost in transitu; 
and it has put in requisition no small degree of attach- 
ment to the house of their fathers, and no small degree 
of Christian principle, to make the sacrifices that have 
been indispensable to our continuance as a well organ- 



32 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



ized department in the house of God. While none of 
us are without lingering attachments to these ancient 
courts, few if any among ourselves now question the 
expediency, the duty of the removal. We have been a 
harmonious people for six and forty years ; and we are 
now harmonious in this great and agitating question. 
And although we cannot say that we leave these walls 
without regret, we can say we leave them for conscience 
sake, and at the bidding of our divine Leader. The 
house does not belong to us, but to Him ; and therefore 
we are bound to husband the property entrusted to us 
for the best interests of His kingdom. We bid it adieu, 
to follow the guidance of his providence, and pitch our 
tabernacle under the pillar and the cloud. These seats 
will no longer be occupied by us ; this pulpit will hence- 
forth be silent. To }^ou who have long rejected the gospel 
as here proclaimed, it now makes its last call. Prayer 
will no longer ascend from this altar ; the songs of this 
temple will now cease. Farewell, then, thou endeared 
house of God ! thou companion and friend of my youth, 
thou comforter of my later years, thou scene of toil 
and of repose, of apprehension and of hope, of sorrow 
and of joy, of man's infirmity and God's omnipotent 
grace, farewell ! Sweet pulpit, farewell! Blessed altar, 
farewell! Throne of grace, as here erected, and where 
God no longer records his name, farewell ! 

But not to Thee, thou that hearest prayer, thou God 
of Zion, who dost still dwell with man on the earth — 
not to thee, who hast said, " Wherever I record my name, 
I will come unto thee, and I will bless thee,' 7 do we say 
farewell ! " The desire of our souls is to thy name, 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



83 



and to the remembrance of Thee. Whom have we in 
heaven but Thee, and what is there on the earth that 
we desire beside thee ?" Even now, at this late, this 
last hour, from the bottom of our hearts do w T e say, 11 If 
thy presence go not with us, carry us not up hence." 
If we forget Thee, ever blessed and adorable Saviour, or 
the church which thou hast purchased, or the Mount 
Zion where thou dwellest, let our right hand forget her 
cunning, let our tongue cleave to the roof of our mouth, 
if we prefer not Thee and these above our chief joy ! 

Nor, my beloved people, is it to you that your pastor 
says farewell. These brick walls and this plastered 
ceiling, and these pillars and seats, do not constitute the 
Brick Presbyterian Church. Ye are these constituents, 
and " ye are our glory and joy." The winter of life is 
too near for me to have much personal interest in your 
arrangements for the future. My personal interests and 
repose would be the better consulted by remaining 
where we are. My heart's desire and prayer to G-od, 
and my most vivid hopes, are for your usefulness and 
benefit, rather than my own. I would not see you a 
dispersed people. And while it is with concern that I 
say this, it is with hope rather than fear. I would fain 
live to see you lengthening your cords and strengthen- 
ing your stakes. But whether I live or die, God will 
assuredly be with you, and bring you to the place of his 
sanctuary. " If I shall find favour in his eyes, he will 
show me both it and his habitation. But if he say thus, 
I have no delight in thee, behold here I am, let him do 
as seemeth good unto him !" Thus far he has led us on 
in mercy. 

3 



34: 



MEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS. 



These days of solicitude and agitation will soon be 
over. The " root of Jesse" yet stands as an " ensign 
to the people, and his rest shall be glorious." Only 
take diligent heed and be very courageous to do his will, 
to love the Lord your God, and to walk in his ways, and 
to keep his commandments, and to cleave unto him, and 
to serve him with all your heart and all your soul, and 
his presence and blessing shall be with you and yours 
for a great while to come ! The Lord bless you and 
keep you ; the Lord cause his face to shine upon you, 
and be gracious unto you ; the Lord lift up his counte- 
nance upon you, and give you peace ! His name be 
upon you and your children ! Amen and amen ! And 
let all the people say, amen ! 



DEDICATION SERMON ; 



PREACHED ON THE LAST LORD'S DAY OP OCTOBER, 1858, AT THE 
OPENING OP THE BRICK PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH ON 
MURRAY HILL, IN THE CITY OP NEW YORK. 



THE SANCTUARY. 



" Ye shall reverence my sanctuary." — Leviticus xis. 30. 

Strong has been the desire of him who addresses you 
to see this auspicious day ; more strong than his expec- 
tations. The removal of a church hallowed by so many 
affecting associations as those concentrated around the 
place of our fathers' sepulchres ; a church that has borne 
no insignificant part in our national history, and where 
so many distinguished men and fathers of the American 
Revolution worshipped ■ a church, the foundation of 
which was laid with their own hands ; a church memor- 
able for the power of God in the conversion of men, and 
endeared to so many now scattered over this broad land ; 
was an enterprise which none of us anticipated without 
misgivings of heart, and none counted on accomplishing 
without difficulty. These difficulties met us on every 
side ; but " having obtained help of God, we continue 
to the present day," the same organized community with 
which such multitudes have identified their sweetest 
hopes, where their graces flourished, whence their pray- 
ers ascended, and on which they now look down in the 
gladness of anticipation and with the fervor of praise. 
We have no ordinary cause for thanksgiving to God, 



38 



THE SANCTUARY. 



and for mutual gratulation that, after an exile of two 
and a half years, we at length assemble in these courts. 

We meet on this day of our holy solemnities to dedi- 
cate this edifice to Him to whose name and praise, we 
trust, it will ever be devoted. We would honour Him, 
by putting honour upon the institutions of his own ap- 
pointment 5 He himself would have us reverence his 
sanctuary. 

The subject of this discourse, therefore, is that one 
great word — 

The Sanctuary, comprising, as it does, the Divine 
presence — its moral power — its benevolent influence — 
its conservative principles — and its social character. 

We reverence it, 

I. In the first place, as the House of God. 

When we come to it, we shut the door on the world, 
and think of the Great and Glorious Being who occupies 
it. It was his early promise, " In all places where I re- 
cord my name, I will come unto thee, and I will bless 
thee.' 7 His presence consecrated the field and the stone 
where Jacob slept. It consecrated the bush on Horeb, 
and the " tabernacle of witness" in the wilderness. It 
consecrated the Temple at Jerusalem as u an habitation 
for the mighty God of Jacob/' and made its history the 
history of earth and heaven. It was holy ground, be- 
cause God was there. No uncircumcised could enter it, 
nor any unclean thing be offered on its altars. When 
the Hebrews were exiles in a strange land, their harps 
hung upon the willows, because they had no symbols of 
the Divine presence. When their temple was pillaged 
and burnt, and the wall of their city broken down, and 



THE SANCTUARY. 



39 



its palaces destroyed with fire, and they became tribu- 
tary to foreign kings j their glory was departed, because 
the Shekinah was gone, and the God of Israel was no 
longer among them. And when, in after times, their 
temple was desecrated by all the rites of Paganism, and 
the statue of Jupiter was set up on the altar of burnt 
offering, it was no longer a sanctuary. And now, when 
the proud Moslem sits upon the throne of David, and 
the mosque of Omar stands on Mount Zion, how em- 
phatically is the lesson inculcated on the world, that the 
God of Israel dwells no longer in Jerusalem, no longer 
in Mount Gerizim, but with every assembly of worship- 
pers gathered in his name. 

This is the high privilege of every Christian sanctu- 
ary. If the Pagan world reverences its temples as the 
dwelling-place of its deities, how much more ought 
Christians to look upon their sanctuaries as sacred in 
the sanctity of their Oracle, and the presence of their 
God. 

Solemn thought, that the King Eternal, immortal 
and invisible, before whom the loftiest and the holiest 
are lost in amazement, bows his heavens and comes 
down to these earthly courts ! Yet is it a thought that 
cheers us, because, while he comes in the splendor of his 
rectitude, he comes in the gushing tenderness of his 
compassions ; while he comes to stamp disappointment 
and mockery on every hope which rests not on him, he 
comes as the refuge and hope of the lowly ; and comes 
not so much in the glory that encircled Sinai, and made 
the prophet tremble, as in the winning loveliness, the 
blended and attractive glory which shines in the face of 
Jesus Christ. 



40 



THE SANCTUARY. 



Well may we turn aside to see this great sight, " God 
with us," within the walls of an earthly temple. In lowly 
reverence we fall before this present Deity • the celes- 
tial here bending to the terrestrial ; the unseen and all- 
seeing One dwelling in the frame-work which is of man's 
device. " How dreadful is this place!" yet how delight- 
ful! 11 Surely this is none other than the house of 
God, and the gate of heaven !" Well may all hearts 
shout with joy at the condescension of this reconciled 
God, The sanctuary is the presence chamber of the 
King of Kings ; his own royal banqueting-house, and 
the "mountain of his holiness." If we look into the 
book of nature, or into the revelations of conscience, or 
into the writings of human philosophy and the specu- 
lations of science, we find nothing that answers the ques- 
tion, What and where is God ? It is an absolute, 
abstract Deity the human mind always thinks of, until 
he is revealed in the person of his Son. The sanctuary 
draws aside the veil, behind which the great Jehovah 
" dwells in the thick darkness." There we find the God 
whom we are not afraid to think of and to hold fellow- 
ship with, and who, to all the varied attributes of great- 
ness, adds those varied manifestations of goodness which 
command our submission, our filial love, our trusting 
confidence. No earthly joy and honour, no patronage 
of the rich and learned, no crowded assemblies, no arm 
of flesh, no tokens of public favour, can be to us instead 
of his presence and glory. What are all the formality 
and gorgeousness of worship, if he who is a Spirit be 
not here worshipped in spirit and in truth ? What is 
all human teaching, with its well digested thoughts and 



THE SANCTUARY. 41 

\ 

charms of utterance, if God's own lips speak not, and 
the soft whispers of his love breathe not? Say to us, 
\hou God of Zion, " My presence shall go with thee, 
and I will give thee rest !" We would behold the 
beauty of the Lord, as we have seen it in the sanctuary. 
Our prosperity depends upon the bright visions of his 
glory. that he would walk amid the golden candle- 
sticks, and make this place of his feet glorious ! The 
inward tokens of his presence are the best pledge that 
we shall enjoy the outward tokens of his favour. Give 
us these, and there will not be wanting those who will 
say, " We will go with you, for we have heard the Lord 
is with you." 

IT. We reverence the sanctuary, in the second place, 

FOR ITS MORAL POWER. 

Men are apostate and sinful. Sin has impoverished 
them. They have wants which nothing but unearthly 
resources can supply, " having no hope and without God 
in the world." Iniquity is their ruin. So long as ini- 
quity rankles in their bosoms, it proves the sharpened 
tooth of the undying worm ; the fires of perdition can- 
not be quenched, so long as men remain the victims of 
wickedness. 

It is no marvel, therefore, that the most comprehen- 
sive purpose of the Divine mind terminates in securing 
and perpetuating the interests of holiness. His works, 
his providence, together with the rich and varied mani- 
festations of his great and glorious nature, ever have had 
for their object the great interests of holiness in the 
world in which we dwell. The mightiest movement his 
wisdom and love ever dictated aims at here constructing 



42 



THE SANCTUARY. 



a highway that shall be called " the way of holiness.' 7 
Holiness is the ultimate good. There is nothing better 
that God seeks after, and nothing else he has made such, 
sacrifices to secure. 

In the accomplishment of this great work the sanctu- 
ary has a part to perform, which can be performed by 
no other instrumentality. Where no vision is, the 
people perish. Men rarely become moral, never reli- 
gious, dissociated and severed from the house of God. 
If the sanctuary has an interest in the happiness of men, 
it is a happiness that is inseparable from a holy and 
virtuous character. What it most seeks to promote is 
a character that God loves, a character that is progres- 
sively like his own, a character cherished by all that is 
binding in the obligations of law, all that is rich in the 
plenitude of grace, all that is tender in the sympathies 
of our Great High Priest, and all that is stimulating in 
those " exceeding great and precious promises" whereby 
his people are made partakers of the divine nature. 
Do you ask, How the sanctuary effects this great object ? 
we answer, By the power of truth, the power of prayer, 
and the power of the Holy Ghost. Here is the truth of 
God, presenting the thoughts and affections of the in- 
finite to the finite, and opening that exhaustless store- 
house of motives so wondrously suited to man ? s intel- 
lectual, moral and sensitive nature. Here is the Spirit 
of all grace, without which truth is powerless, and with 
which it receives the welcome of the warm affections, is 
enthroned in the chambers of the inner man, and sancti- 
fies and saves. Here, too, is that heaven-ordained spirit 
of grace and supplication, setting in motion all other 



THE SANCTUARY. 



43 



instruments, and agencies, and demonstrating man's 
impotence and God's faithfulness as a prayer-hearing 
God. 

"We may not speak loosely when we speak of this 
moral influence of the sanctuary. It is not the mere 
form of godliness it would secure, but the power ; it is 
not names, but things ; it is not the shadow, but the 
substance. Pagan ablutions, and Papal crosses, and 
sprinklings are not piety. The ostentation of religious 
observances, and the decencies of a visible morality are 
sometimes found among the scoffers at all heart religion. 
A Christian creed and a Christian profession are not 
unknown among those who are dead in trespasses and 
sins. Inspect the fruits of the sanctuary, and it will be 
found that it is the rain of heaven and the sun of 
righteousness by which they are matured, and the hand 
of the sanctifier that gathers them. Holiness has taken 
the place of sin, gladness the place of sorrow, light of 
darkness, hope of despair, life of death, where the 
sanctuary is clothed with power. Nor do we hesitate^ 
to say that, various as are the means by which th& 
world is converted to God, and beautifully cooperative* 
as they are, the pivot on which the machinery rests,, the* 
main shaft that impels it, its motive power is the fire- oil: 
God's altars. To this hallowed spot the church militant 
and the church triumphant look with hope, and here froia 
under the sanctuary the waters issue that give life to tte 
world. The very walls of the sanctuary are monitors, 
and the entrance in at the doors read& the lesson. 
" This is the way, walk ye in it." There is no safer 
path, nor is there a more effective repulse to the, 



44 



THE SANCTUARY. 



Tempter than to say to him, I am going to the house of 
God. 

I love to look at the sanctuary in the retired village 
or the crowded city ; in the bold foreground, or the 
retreating shadows of the distant landscape. It is God's 
vineyard, where "the vine flourishes, and the tender 
grape appears/' while around its consecrated walls is 
" God's acre," where the plants of righteousness, thickly 
set and deep, are gathering their immortal bloom. The 
beauties of holiness and the glories of immortality are 
there. Yes, I love to look at such a scene, and to say 
when I look at it, "How goodly are thy tents, Jacob, 
and thy tabernacles, Israel ; as valleys are they spread 
forth, as gardens by the river's side, as lign aloes 
which the Lord hath planted, and as cedar trees beside 
the waters!" The dewy eve, the blushing morn fade in 
comparison with this garden of God, sparkling in the 
beauties of holiness, and fragrant with its sweet perfume. 
Bashan languisheth, and the flower of Lebanon languish- 
ed ; holiness never withers, its leaf is green even in the 
year of drought. Glorious beyond all but the fore- 
telling pen of prophecy, are the bright destinies of the 
sanctuary : glorious to feel and enjoy, glorious to be- 
hold, and in seasons of darkness and despondency, glori- 
ous to look for. When that hope is realized, there will 
be the jubilee of the world. The ingathering of the 
great harvest year shall have come, when the " plowman 
shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes 
him that soweth seed, and the mountains drop down 
sweet wine, and all the hills do melt." Intimately con- 
nected with these, thoughts 



THE SANCTUARY. 



45 



III. There is a third reason for this religious reverence 
for the sanctuary, and that is its active benevolence. 

The Church of God, from its origin and organization, 
from the laws by which it is governed, and the profes- 
sion and character of its members, from the peculiar 
privileges it enjoys and the means of its advancement, 
from its opportunities for usefulness, and the promis- 
ed favor of its Great Head, possesses notoriety and 
preeminence. She is like a city set on a hill, which 
cannot be hid. While generation after generation has 
passed away, and thrones and dynasties have vanished, 
and proud institutions have crumbled to the dust, and 
every ancient work of man is lost ; this great work of 
God remains — a living community in a dying world, a 
spiritual community, youthful and vigorous, where all 
things else grow old and decay. 

God's sanctuary is everywhere invested with this 
commanding position, in order to impose upon it the 
obligations of active service : " To whom much is given, 
of him also much shall be required." Its mission is to 
" do good and communicate." It is not erected to be 
looked at and admired, but to speak to us, to act upon 
us. Its province and its office are to send out its sym- 
pathies to the ignorant, and enlighten them ; the wander- 
ing and reclaim them ; the lost, and save them. We 
hold of very little account that cold and dead orthodoxy 
which paralyzes effort. The professed Christian who 
folds his hands and congratulates himself that he has 
nothing to do for a world that lieth in wickedness, 
because believing is his business, and not working, is in 
nothing better than the* slothful servant. An enlightened 



46 



THE SANCTUARY. 



belief in the doctrines of grace, so far from diminishing 
Christian diligence, impels to it by superadded obliga- 
tions and motives. Our obligations to holiness and to 
every form of active service, are just as real and just as 
binding as they would have been, had the Saviour never 
fulfilled all righteousness ; just as real and just as bind- 
ing as they would have been had we been justified by 
the deeds of law. If salvation is of grace, it is unto works, 
we are fellow-workers with God. He works in us that 
we may work. We look to him as though he did all, 
and we labor as though all the work were our own. 
We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excel- 
lency of the power may be all of God and not of us ; 
yet do 1 1 we strive mightily, according to the grace that 
worketh in us mightily." Nor is this cooperation the 
less obvious and delightful because our agency is human 
and his divine. It is " the worm Jacob" that is to 
" thrash the mountains, and beat them small, and make 
the hills as chaff." 

Such is the creed of the sanctuary, and with this it 
stands in the midst of a perishing world. None are 
overlooked by it, old or young, far off or near. Em- 
phatically are the tjoung its charge, because God has 
committed them to it ; it is the sanctuary that modifies 
and moulds their character. It has a larger heart, too, 
and a more enlarged vision than this. It looks over 
this sin-struck earth, and cares for the heathen at home 
and the heathen abroad. Its thoughts, its counsels, its 
prayers, its gifts, its deeds of self-denial and endurance 
form no inconsiderable part of the history of the Church 
of God. 



THE SANCTUARY. 



47 



You wonder, perhaps, that I utter such obvious 
truths ; not only would I utter but enforce them. If God 
requires it of his ministers that they be working men, 
he also requires it of his churches that they be working 
churches. What kind of a light would that be that 
does not shine, or what sort of a church is that which 
has no forthgoing activity ? What is Christianity with- 
out the benevolent deeds which Christianity produces ? 
We do not ask what the sanctuary is, so much as what 
the sanctuary does. There may be a dead sanctuary as 
well as a dead faith. A dead sanctuary ! what is it ? 
There is no heart there, and no active pulsations ; it is 
no living temple ; it is Death ! If it acts not, it lives 
not ; its sublimest devotions are but sounding brass and 
a tinkling cymbal, without its active character. If this 
edifice is worthy the place it occupies, and the cause to 
which we devote it, we must have an honest and an 
earnest Christianity, permeated with more of the popu- 
lar element, employing more heads, more hearts and 
more hands. We must have a willing people, and lay 
under contribution every tribe, every family, every 
man. This is what sanctuaries are built for. They are 
not built for the minister, but for the people. The 
minister is not the church, nor is the pulpit the sanctu- 
ary. It is the solitude of his toil that is very apt to dis- 
hearten even the most courageous laborer. The differ- 
ence between a ministry standing alone and a ministry 
upheld and encouraged by the favor and cooperation of 
an effective church, cannot be known this side eternity. 
Negligence is the sin of Christians, and it is no small 
sin. The want of well-doing is one of the devil's forms 



48 



THE SANCTUARY. 



of evil-doing. The Saviour's maxim was, 11 1 must 
work." I must " work the work of him that sent me 
while it is day ; the night cometh, in which no man can 
work." We cannot prolong the day of labor an hour. 
Time does not wait for our indecision, nor death for our 
delay. It would be a lamentable narrative hereafter to 
be told, that the generation which is now passing 
through this house of Grod has left no luminous track 
behind it. 

Nor let it be thought that we derogate from the dig- 
nity and sacredness of our subject, when we remark — 

IY. In the fourth place, that the sanctuary is dis- 
tinguished for its CONSERVATIVE PRINCIPLES. 

It is no enemy to reform and progress ; yet is it no 
part of its principles or its policy to " do evil that good 
may come." It hails every aggressive movement on the 
kingdom of darkness ; yet it is not heedless of conse- 
quences. Reform and progress are its great object ; 
yet it has no organ of destructiveness. While it is not 
blind to existing evils, it dreads the evils of premature 
reform. So long as it acts in its true character, its aim 
is to make the world wiser, better, and happier ; nor 
will its work be accomplished until " the Lord God shall 
cause righteousness and praise to spring forth before all 
nations." Yet it does not run riot, even in advancing 
the right and eradicating the wrong, lest by ill-timed 
and unhallowed zeal it should lose more than it would 
gain. 

If the world in which we dwell is so impregnate with 
wickedness that it cannot endure the teachings of 
heavenly wisdom without secret hostility, or open tur- 



THE SANCTUARY. 



49 



bulence, we may not forget that the bitterness, the tur- 
moil, the angry invective and strife of the world belong 
not to the house of G-od. It is no friend to rancour 
and bitterness, even in a good cause. We accord to it, 
nay we claim for it its controversy with evil ; and it is a 
controversy which is uncompromising. But we see not 
why it may not breast itself in the very front of the 
battle, without " scattering fire-brands, arrows, and 
death." It is not the fiery meteor, but rather is it like 
the moon, wading in her brightness through a night of 
storms. Embarrassing, obscuring clouds it may look 
for, but it shines by its own light, pure and white, 
though making its way through Egyptian darkness. It 
is no thunder cloud, filling the hearts of men with fear ; 
nor when its seals are opened, do the stars of heaven 
fall to the earth as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs. 
No, no ! Soft and gentle breezes blow from Mount 
Zion ; the sun of righteousness lingers upon its sum- 
mit, and bright visions open upon the vale below. 

The longer I live, the more am I convinced that this 
is one of the great characteristics of the sanctuary. It 
was not the earthquake, nor the strong wind, nor the 
fire, that made the prophet wrap his face in his mantle, 
but the still, small voice. 

We forget our office when we needlessly ignite and 

inflame the worst passions of the human heart, and 

strike blow after blow upon the foundations of public 

tranquility. The great statute-book of the sanctuary is 

a cautious instructor, enforcing its lessons with "the 

meekness of wisdom." There is much that it teaches, 

and some truths which it does not teach ; wisely leaving 
4 



50 



THE SANCTUARY. 



the great principles it inculcates, like the leaven hid in 
three measures of meal, to their quiet and progressive 
power. If the Apostle Paul could have had the private 
ear of Nero, I have no doubt he would have told him 
truths which the Spirit of God would not allow him 
publicly to declare to the Christians at Rome. His ob- 
ject was not to agitate and revolutionize, but to regene- 
rate and reform. Sudden changes in the polity and 
affairs of the world the sanctuary does not look for. It 
aims not so much at rudely undermining old institutions, 
and demolishing old landmarks, as at leaving them 
silently and gradually to crumble and wither under the 
subduing power of truth and love. A few wild and un- 
seasonable blasts of the trumpet may produce a storm 
which even the " Sermon on the Mount,' 7 a thousand 
times repeated, cannot assuage. There is no such re- 
forming power as the cross of Christ. And the beauty 
of the reform is, that it is accomplished without doing 
any harm. When the sanctuary concentrates the energ}^ 
of its intellect, the ardor of its emotions, and its fiery 
zeal, in a prolonged crusade against some one social evil, 
it is very apt to lose sight of its appropriate work, to 
exhaust its vigor in a foreign service, and in the end of 
its eccentric course, take up the lamentation, " They 
made me keeper of the vineyards, but my own vineyard 
have I not kept." 

Our own land stands first and foremost of all lands in 
the unshackled influence of the sanctuary. For his re- 
ligious principles no man is here accountable but to his 
Maker. The church has no jealousy of the State, and 
the State has no jealousy of the church. We have 



THE SANCTUARY. 



51 



no inmingling of the cross and the clay. There is no 
ecclesiastical domination to dictate the measures of the 
government, and " no Star Chamber to trample the 
rights of conscience under the heel of arbitrary power." 
Our obligations, therefore, as American churches, stand 
abreast with our high privileges. In a land where the 
people influence the government, rather than the go- 
vernment the people ; where public opinion originates 
the laws ; where the church can prosper without the 
State, better than the State without the church ; and 
where the religion of the gospel stands confessed as the 
only bulwark of national security, the sanctuary has 
obligations of no ordinary kind. Our free institutions 
do not adhere to our soil or climate, nor do our rich 
prairies nourish them, nor are they imbedded in our 
mountains ; they rest on the influence of the sanctuary. 
Selfish politicians, noisy patriots, and profligate court- 
iers, are not for the State to lean upon. Our prosperity, 
our union is inseparable from our Christian character. 
The severe schooling and steady habits of our fathers 
laid the foundation of our greatness, and it has thus far 
been protected and sustained by the laws of that king- 
dom which is not of this world. What the future will 
be, we know not ; if we have fears, it is because we 
have fears for the influence of the sanctuary ; and if we 
have more and stronger hopes than fears, it is because 
the sanctuary is his abode who " ruleth the raging of 
the sea, and stilleth the tumult of the people." Mer- 
curial and fiery spirits may find a place within its walls, 
and threatening voices and mighty thunderings may agi- 
tate it ; but there are words of peace above the howl- 



52 



THE SANCTUARY. 



ings of the storm. If a bright horizon is yet to open 
upon us ; if "young America/ 7 with her head-strong 
impulsiveness, is preserved from the turbulence of 
anarchy ; if, in the murky atmosphere that now and 
then envelops us, and if, amid the hoarse and sharp 
rumbling of the cavern beneath us, we avoid or survive 
the earthquake, it will be because " knowledge, with 
strength of salvation, is the stability of our times. 7 ' 

If it so happens that we live in an age when these 
thoughts are unwelcome, or are looked upon with sus- 
picion, or will be misinterpreted and abused, the more is 
the pity, and the more is the need of them. Well as- 
sured am I that the time will come when they will re- 
ceive a hearty response from all right-hearted men, and 
that experience will show that " wisdom is justified of 
her children." We ask for this house of God that it 
may be baptized with the spirit of wisdom, and long re- 
main as God's witness to whatsoever things are lovely, 
whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are pure, 
whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are of 
good report. Should the time ever come when it ceases 
\to be the reprover of wickedness, and at the same time 
the patron of good order, some weeping prophet may 
survey its ruins and say, 11 How is the gold become dim, 
and the most fine gold changed l v Give us this spirit- 
ual, this conservative character, and our ' 1 walls will be 
salvation and our gates praise." 

V. We reverence the sanctuary, in the last place, for 

ITS SOCIAL AND FRATERNAL CHARACTER. 

There is but one true religion in the universe. The 
religion of heaven and the religion of earth, varying as 



THE SANCTUAKY. 



53 



they do in measure, are in their nature essentially the 
same. 

The sanctuary is the house of prayer for all people. 
It is the symbol of man's brotherhood, and stands forth 
as the sacred asylum of fallen humanity. So far from 
being appointed for one nation, one clime, one class, or 
colour, it recognizes no distinction of names or persons, 
and no covenant of peculiarity. Of all places in the 
world, it is the place where Jew and Gentile, rich and 
poor, bond and free, wise and unwise, seamen and 
landsmen, the stranger and the home born, are regarded 
with a Christian impartiality. And why should it not 
be so ? They are alike the offspring of the same Al- 
mighty Parent ; invested with the same intelligent and 
immortal existence ; subjects of the same moral govern- 
ment • equally the heirs of sin and the curse, and the 
offered salvation ; all born to trouble, as the sparks fly 
upward ; all destined to lie down in the grave, to stand 
at the bar of the final Judge, and, as they employ this 
day of grace, to be at last associated in the same blessed 
heaven, or in the same awful hell. 

All have a common interest, therefore, in the house 
of God. Attractive it may be to the rich, but never 
ought to be repulsive to the poor. One of its peculiar- 
ities is, that " the rich and the poor meet together" at 
its altars. It speaks to all : to the peasant in his hut 
and to the king on his throne ; to the saint in his closet 
and the criminal in his dungeon ; to the children of 
want and woe everywhere. It is the great leveller ; not 
by obliterating all human distinctions, but by making a 
distinction that absorbs them all ; not by depressing the 



54 



THE SANCTUARY. 



high, but by elevating the low, and raising both to the 
dignity of " the sons and daughters of the Lord God 
Almighty." 

Man is a social being ; his religious privileges, and 
obligations, and hopes are intimately inwoven with this 
great element of his nature. Most beautifully and 
wonderfully are the social relations made subservient to 
his immortality. Christian churches are not more cer- 
tainly the nurseries of the church in heaven, than 
Christian families are the nurseries of the church on 
earth. If you survey the lands where God's altars are 
thrown down, or have never been erected, you will be 
apt to find them lands where the social and domestic 
ties are sacrificed to those that are more public ; where 
the endearments of private life are usurped by a proud 
ambition, and the allurements to personal piety are lost 
in the clamor and bustle of the world. u Come, thou 7 
and all thy house into the ark f this is the voice which 
issues from the sanctuary of God. Our attachments to 
the sanctuary may well be expressive of our attachment 
to the worship and the God of our fathers ; and well 
may they be strengthened by the sweet memories of the 
domestic circle. I would not part with these sacred 
reminiscences. how sweetly they sometimes come 
back upon us in the days of pensiveness and grief ; and 
when we stand in silence over the honoured grave of 
the departed, and where, amid the many bonds that 
united us, none is more valued than that which bound 
us to the house of God ! We honour the solitary cham- 
ber where grief is bathed in tears, and the mourner 
takes refuge, by himself, in the bosom of eternal love : 



THE SANCTUARY. 



55 



but it is not as when assembled Israel, in the day of 
their rebuke, bowed together in heaviness at the even- 
ing sacrifice. We sympathize with the publican when 
he went up alone to the temple to pray ; but it is a 
more cheering scene to look at which the Psalmist 
speaks of when he says, "We took pweet counsel to- 
gether, and went to the house of G-od in company.'* 
There is beauty and forth-going praise in the lonely star 
that twinkles in the retiring cloud ; but it falls short of 
the beauty of the spangled heavens, nor is it the adoring- 
anthem when " the morning stars sang together, and all 
the sons of God shouted for joy," 

And may we not extend these thoughts to the great 
brotherhood of churches of every name ? Christian 
men are Christian men everywhere. Though they have 
been dispersed through different ages of time, and are 
now dispersed through different sections of the church 
of God, they are the same Christian men everywhere. 
Though they differ in their intellectual endowments and 
acquisitions, and even in' their spiritual character, joys, 
and influences, they are still good and Christian men. 
Like scattered rays of light and love, they all radiate 
from God's sanctuary. Their religion is one ; they 
themselves are constituent parts of the one body, of 
which Christ is the head ; one temple, of which he is 
the Deity ; one sphere, of which he is the sun. 

Whence, then, this moral chaos ? Why this scatter- 
ing of the one fold of the Great Shepherd ? Whence is 
it that the old faith and the old charity are separated by 
almost impassable barriers ? Why this " party coloured 
blazonry/ 7 and this " cross-firing 7 ' of the hosts marshal- 



56 



THE SANCTUARY. 



ed under the Captain of our salvation ? "We plead for 
God's sanctuary ; and on its behalf we ask for what we 
have ever given, and hold ourselves ready to give — the 
interchanged tokens of love and influence, which the 
Bible not only justifies, but demands. That book of 
God has its standard of church fellowship, and here it 
is : " Grace be with all them that love our Lord Jesus 
Christ in sincerity \" Here it is still more definitely : 
" In Christ Jesus, neither circumcision availeth any- 
thing, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature. And as 
many as walk according to this rule, peace be on them, 
and mercy upon the Israel of God !" Here it is again, 
in the words of our loving Master : ' ' Father, I pray 
that they all may he one, as thou, Father, art in me, and 
I in thee, that they may be one in us, that the world may 
believe that thou hast sent me I" Who can stand before 
such an appeal as this ? Where is now the stern Ana- 
baptist, and the unyielding pretender to apostolic suc- 
cession, and the sturdy champion of the exclusive divine 
right of Presbytery, and the devout advocate for the 
literal version of the Psalms of David, who of such fig- 
ments would erect a wall of brass around the sanctuary ? 

We have no desire to be regarded as " uncommon 
pretenders to charity." Ye are our witnesses that we 
are not slow in 11 contending earnestly for the faith once 
delivered to the saints." Yet we have no war, except 
with error and sin ; and where the error is radical to 
the Christian system, or essential to the Christian charac- 
ter, it is a war of extermination. But we have long 
since learned that conformity is not essential to unity, 
nor to Christian fellowship. " The kingdom of God is 



THE SANCTUARY. 



57 



not meat and drink, but righteousness and peace, and 
joy in the Holy Ghost." The more the faith and fellow- 
ship of Christ prevail, the more will they lead his fol- 
lowers to fellowship with each other. The sanctuary 
calls upon us to receive and acknowledge all Christians, 
of every name, who are Christians indeed. we are 
sick at heart of this dismembered body of Christ ! Nor 
do we mean in this matter to be fettered by sectarian 
intolerance, or awed by the authority of men. Blessed 
be God, the time is coming when the "watchmen shall 
see eye to e} T e, and lift up their voice together, and 
with the voice together shall they sing." We look for 
such a day, and on this side the heavenly world. And 
what a beautiful expression of the object and design of 
the sanctuary and of the spirit of heaven ! The sanctu- 
ary below is but the vestibule to the sanctuary above. 
We would not come to it, feeling that we are dissociated 
from any one of the families of the redeemed, any more 
than we are dissociated from " the house not made with 
hands, eternal in the heavens." There the earthly sanc- 
tuary terminates in the companionship of "an innu- 
merable company of angels, and the spirits of just men 
made perfect, and God, the Judge of all, and Jesus, the 
Mediator of the new covenant." 

Such is God's sanctuary. Who can appreciate it ? — 
its object, its toil, its solicitudes and discouragements, 
its expectations and successes, its honours and rewards ; 
what is there on the earth to be compared with these ? 
In its moral power and permanent influence it stands 
preeminent above the forum, above the Senate house, 
above the battle field, and above the press. Thought 



58 



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looks to it for instruction ; the wounded conscience 
looks to it as its refuge, and the burdened heart for its 
repose. Lisping childhood looks to it, and buoyant 
youth, and vigorous manhood, and hoary age. Christian- 
ity looks to it as its defender, and as the heaven-desig- 
nated herald of its glad tidings. The history of the 
sanctuary would be the history of Christianity, in all its 
lights and shadows, in all its depression and triumph, in 
all its conflicts and victories. Nations live or die as 
their sanctuaries rise or fall. Woe to the land that is 
not the land of the Sabbath and the sanctuary! All the 
w r orld over, with the exception of those temples where 
God once dwelt, and from which his glory is departed, 
an intimate sympathy will be found to exist between 
the sanctuary and the best interests of men. If Scot- 
land, from having been " one of the rudest, one of the 
poorest, one of the most turbulent countries in Europe," 
has become " one of the most virtuous, one of the most 
highly civilized, one of the most nourishing, one of the 
most tranquil/ 7 it is because " He that dwells between 
the cherubims there shines forth. 77 

When a body of Puritans in the North of England, 
and after them a body of the " Scotch-Irish 77 removed 
to this western wilderness, in order to enjoy liberty of 
conscience, their rallying point was the house of God. 
And now, like a wreath of perennial flowers, every- 
where adorning hill and valley, their scattered temples 
are inmingling their hallowed incense with the winds of 
our mountains and the spray of our iron-bound coast. 
A right-minded foreigner can hardly pass through the 
length and breadth of this land without observing that 



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59 



one of our strong peculiarities is a religious reverence 
for God's sanctuary. What citadels of strength are 
these unnumbered Christian temples, everywhere lifting 
their spires toward heaven ! Should ever the time 
come when a barbarous deluge, like that which inun- 
dated the fairest portions of Europe during the Middle 
Ages, passes over this fair land, among its first and 
most ruthless desolations would be found a desecrated 
or a desolated sanctuary. 

These thoughts give interest to this welcome hour. 
While the tide of life has been sweeping away the land- 
marks of the past, some few remain who saw our ancient 
sanctuary in its glory, and still more who witnessed its 
decay. Thanks to God, the overflowing waters have 
thus far been restrained from invading these altars. 
We have lived to see the top stone of this edifice laid, 
and its doors open to us. We have nothing to ask for 
in the external and material arrangements of this house. 
It is not a gorgeous edifice ; it has no decorated walls 
and arches, and no splendid magnificence. Yet are 
there stability and comfort, and tasteful architecture, 
which do honour to the genius and fidelity of those em- 
ployed in projecting, erecting, and embellishing it. 
" Strength and beauty are in his sanctuary." We have 
sufficient interest and sufficient gratification in the ex- 
ternal and the material ; God grant that we may have 
a deeper feeling for the internal and the spiritual ! 
Why should the visible captivate us, and the lust of the 
eye and the pride of life charm our hearts to those things 
that are seen, instead of attracting them to the unseen 
realities, of which these symbols, these appearances are 
only the shadow. 



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The sanctuary is more than ornamental architecture, 
and harmonious music, and external worship. We look 
above and across the visible to Him who is invisible. 
It is the selected spot where the Almighty architect 
forms the materials of "the living temple, built up with 
lively stones, an holy temple in the Lord, an habitation 
of God through the spirit." It is God's house, and we 
come to dedicate it to him. And there is, in my humble 
judgment, no superstition, but great propriety and truth 
in these acts of dedication. There is, and there ought 
to be, as wide a distinction between the house of God 
and all other places of public resort, as between all that 
is secular and all that is sacred. The one is a select and 
consecrated territory ; the other belongs to the business 
of the world. Secular themes and secular objects have 
their place, but that place is not the sanctuary. From 
our hearts we dedicate this edifice to the God of heaven. 
It is nothing to us if He do not occupy it. Stand up, 
all ye people, and before God, angels and men, con- 
secrate it to his worship and honour, to whom it be- 
longs ! — each one of us humbly looking to him, that he 
would fill it with his great glory. Be it ever sacred to 
him by whose name it is called ! — sacred to his mercy- 
seat and his praise ! — sacred to his pure gospel, to his 
own ordinances, to the fellowship of the saints, the 
conversion of men, and the comfort and edification of 
those who fear God and love his Son. Sacred place ! 
" Arise, Lord God, thou and the ark of thy strength ! 
Let thy priests be clothed with righteousness ; and let 
thy saints shout for joy !" From this good hour let this 
house be devoted only to sacred and religious uses. 



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61 



Here let all that is sacred be put in motion, and all that 
is secular be put at rest. In his name, to whom we 
have thus solemnly dedicated it, we say to you, rever- 
ence God's sanctuary. Prize his ordinances, and teach 
your children to prize them. There are fountains of 
mercy here ; a river the streams whereof make glad the 
city of our God, the holy place of the tabernacles of 
the Most High. Bend over this living fountain and 
drink to the full. Lift up your hands in the sanctuary 
and bless the Lord. The Lord, that made heaven and 
earth, bless thee out of Zion. 

It will not be looked for, on the present occasion, 
that I should repeat those historical notices that were 
given in the last discourse that was delivered in our 
former edifice. It is natural for those who are in an 
advanced period of life to look forward ; Christianity 
looks forward with hope. u The Brick Presbyterian 
Church in the city of New York" will not, we trust, 
prove recreant to its character nor its trust. There 
have been periods when we have had some misgivings 
as to the course this church has pursued ; yet, upon a 
deliberate review of it, it is our welcome conviction that, 
under the Divine favour, the true purpose of the sanc- 
tuary, notwithstanding all our imperfections, has been 
here, in some good measure, accomplished. When we 
look at the number and standing of those ministers 
of the gospel whom its prayers and its bounty have 
sent forth to the world ; when we advert to the part 
it has taken in organizing some, and in sustaining other 
institutions for the spread of the gospel ; when we 
think of the multitudes to whom the gospel has been 



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here preached, and the multitudes who hail from this 
church as their spiritual birth-place ; when we recall its 
conflicts with error and its conservative influence ; when 
we set before our minds the two generations of the 
Lord's people who have gone from us to the upper 
sanctuary, and dwell with such gratified emotions upon 
the scenes of trial through which they passed, and upon 
their peaceful departure ; and when, in our present sur- 
vey of this people, we count so few among this adult 
population who have not named the name of Christ, we 
bow our knees in humility and thankfulness before the 
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, much 
as we have to deplore, we have not run in vain, neither 
labored in vain ; " yet not I, but the grace of God that 
was with me." 

We enter upon our new career under few circum- 
stances of discouragement and many of bright anticipa- 
tion. We are at a sufficient remove from our sister 
churches to forbid all interference or rivalship, while 
we are in the midst of a population that give us wel- 
come, and bid us God's speed. With no ordinary 
gratification, also, we greet the return to our number 
of so many of those who, because the place has been 
too strait for us, have for a short season been the 
adornment of other and more convenient churches. 
We need them, and here, we trust, they will once more 
find themselves at home. 

In the name of the Lord, therefore, we set up 
our banners. It is an eventful age of the world in 
which our enterprise receives this new impulse. They 
are cheering scenes we look upon, as from this mount 



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68 



of vision and this hour of hope we look clown on the 
ages of mercy that already begin to visit our guilty 
world. Even now is the ''earth helping the woman.' 7 
The halls of science, the inventions of art, the resources 
of commerce, and above all these, the facilities of inter- 
national intercourse, are becoming tributary to Him in 
whom all nations shall be blessed, and even the battle 
of the warrior has prepared the way for the Prince of 
Peace. More than all, the everblessed and adorable 
Spirit of God is coming forth to the bright conquests of 
the " latter-day glory." The crisis is approaching, and 
startling events may be looked for in the future history 
both of the Church and the world. Nor may you be 
dismayed, my brethren, if mercy and judgment still 
stand abreast in the redemption of men. If the spirit 
that now worketh in the children of disobedience is 
gone up with his legions on the length and breadth of 
the earth, it is but to herald his own overthrow, and be 
the precursor of " quietness and assurance forever." A 
few fleeting centuries, and the work of the sanctuary 
will be accomplished, and the church militant enjoy her 
repose. 

I have before made the remark, that I did not favor 
the removal which we have lived to witness, from per- 
sonal considerations, for it must be clear that the small 
remnant of my ministry would have been less precari- 
ous and less toilsome had the removal never have 
been effected. As Israel said to Joseph,, I now say to 
you, " Behold, I die ; but God shall be with ijouT Yet 
while I live, I ask no greater joy than to preach the 
gospel to this people. It would be no grief of heart to 



64 



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me to die on the harvest field. I would die in the 
midst of you, and hope that the grandchildren of those 
whom I have attended to their graves, will give me a 
resting place, ever quiet and " Ever Green/' amid their 
fathers' sepulchres, and where so many sheaves have 
been gathered in fully ripe from this field of labor. Nor 
have I anything more to ask for this house, than that 
the God of Zion would here record his name, and that 
amoug the glorious things that shall be spoken of this 
city of our God, it may be said that " this and that 
man was born in her, and that the Highest himself hath 
established her." May we not, my brethren, this day 
offer the prayer, and indeed cherish the hope, the con- 
fidence, that "the glory of this latter house shall be 
greater than that of the former !" Long may this 
sanctuary stand upon this holy hill, as God's witness to 
the favored city and land where we dwell ! Here may 
successive generations begin their everlasting song, and 
your living and dying prayer and mine be, " Peace be 
within thy walls, and prosperity within thy palaces !" 
And when the last trumpet shall shake all things earthly, 
may every living stone of this spiritual temple bear 
yonder immortal inscription, " Holiness to the Lord !" 
How sweet the thought that, worms and sinners as we 
are, we ourselves may then exemplify truth, 11 Behold, 
what hath God wrought ;" and in that far off land where 
the Lord is the light thereof, and the Lamb its glory, our 
voices, with those of the loved and venerated who have 
gone before us, shall swell the chorus, "Blessing, and 
honor, and glory, and power be unto Him that sitteth 
upon the throne, and to the Lamb, forever !" Amen ! 



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